That Night
by VraieEsprit
Summary: Because Saiyuki has been buzzing at my brain lately, a short oneshot from Gojou's perspective about the night after the night Gojou first found Hakkai. Updated to add something for Hakkai - those limiters have always bothered me...
1. Chapter 1

**_Introduction/Disclaimer_**

_So lately I've been falling in love over again with Saiyuuki. I've always loved Hakkai to death but lately I've become more and more fond of Gojou too. So whilst I love Sanzou and Gokuu (especially in the manga), these two remain my favourites and their friendship is something I really like. They're such different guys brought together by tragedy and a chance meeting…which is why this oneshot happened. It's something I'm sure gets written a lot, but even so, I wanted to do it. It's a oneshot, from Gojou's perspective, of the night after the night he found Hakkai._

_Disclaimer: Saiyuuki's characters belong to the wonderful Minekura-sensei, and this fanfic oneshot is written with all the best wishes for her health._

* * *

**~That Night~**

The moon was bright and clear that evening.

In the run down suburbs of an insignificant local town, a cloaked figure hurried from one of the small shacks on the corner of the high road, glancing up at the sky as if in anticipation of further downpours of heavy rain. It had been an unsettled few days, with storms and downpours coming out of nothing, and as the physician dodged the puddles left behind from the last deluge, he slowly became a blur with the lights of the town itself, little more than a ghost disappearing into the mist.

From the doorway of the shack, a lean individual watched him go, putting the cigarette to his lips and fumbling in his pocket for the lighter that was his most trusty companion. Leaning up against the doorpost, he lit the cigarette, inhaling smoke into his lungs and holding it there for a brief moment before exhaling. The cloud drifted lazily on the night air, in no hurry to disperse, and the youth sighed, tossing the lighter up in the air and catching it before sliding it back into his pocket. With a groan, he ran his fingers through his messy hair, knocking free its uneven tie and causing the thick red waves to fall loose over his shoulders. A soft stream of curses dropped from his lips into the silence that surrounded the small, squat building that he called home. Across the street, a drunk was sprawled against the wall, snoring gently as the alcohol worked through his system, but there was nobody else abroad at that time of night and the expletives fell on deaf ears. Nobody had seen the doctor come, nor watched him go.

"You shouldn't smoke around him, not until he's settled a little better. It's quite a deep wound."

The doctor's words echoed in his head, and Gojou glanced at the lit cigarette, murmuring more unrepeatable words before putting it back to his lips and inhaling a second time. It was not a cool night, but smoking outside was a hassle and besides, it was his home. He could smoke where and when he liked, and there was nobody to notice if he ignored the medic's advice. Yet here he was, on his own front step like a pariah, tiptoing around his own home for the benefit of a man who, twenty four hours earlier, he had not even known existed.

Well, he barely knew more than that now.

Gojou's crimson gaze flitted back into the house, snorting with derision at his own soft-heartedness.

"Picking up a strange woman would be one thing, but lumping bloody males about ain't exactly my style," he muttered, flicking ash from the cigarette before putting it to his lips again. "What the hell am I doing, anyway? Running around some complete stranger…using the last of my poker winnings to pay that bent quack to check him over? Fridge is empty, and I'm almost out of cigarettes…yet now I'm playing frigging nursemaid? A month, he said. A month, before this guy's likely to be up on his feet."

He let out another heavy sigh, taking one last drag on the cigarette before stubbing it out with force against the outside of the doorpost and dropping the crushed butt into a nearby puddle.

_Picking up half dead guys in the tipping rain, wrecking my shirt, spending my money…and it ain't like I slept any last night, either. I must be crazy. What do I care if a strange guy dies in the forest? Ain't like it doesn't happen. Round here, getting stiffed out in fights isn't uncommon. More so if it's a human who picks a fight with the wrong kind. You don't come this way if you can't take care of yourself._

His gaze flitted beyond the trees to the shadowy grove where, to those in the know, lay the lair of one of the most notorious local youkai 'families' – that led by the demon Hyakugan-maou. Gojou had never been there himself, nor did he have any interest in what went on in those parts, but he'd heard the stories. Women from human villages taken as sacrifices…well, it was a shame on the women, especially if they were cute, but Gojou wasn't so much of a fool as to jump into a fight for the sake of people he 'd never met.

_And yet I picked up some guy anyway. Maybe it was just the blood…_

Gojou's eyes clouded at this thought, and he turned his back on the outside scenery, retreating back into the small shack and closing the door behind him.

_Maybe all that blood made me think of other things. Sins committed. Taboos. Or maybe it was the way he looked at me. Those eyes…looking through me…as though somehow…satisfied with what he saw_.

His lips thinned.

_Almost like…he was like me. Except he ain't like me. Can see it at first glance…tsch._

He pushed open the door to the small bedroom, lounging against the doorpost as he took in the sleeping form of his unexpected houseguest. He lay motionless, his face pale against the pillow, and Gojou remembered that the physician had said he'd lost a lot of blood – probably more than had been present at the scene where he had collapsed. Gojou had not thought to consider whether the red staining the man's clothes had been from his own wounds until the doctor had asked. In that moment he had felt certain that it had been another's blood that had seeped through the fabric to the skin below, and, as the doctor's examination had progressed, it had become clear that what had at first seemed like a fatal amount of blood loss was actually not a life threatening injury.

_For a human, he's pretty tough. _

Gojou crossed the room slowly, standing over the man and gazing down at his features pensively. The stranger did not stir, but Gojou remembered once again those green eyes, boring into his.

_If he is human. He sure looks it, but he's not like me. Dark hair, green eyes…but then…_

He extended a hesitant finger, pushing the man's head over slightly to the side so that the light glinted off the silver cuffs that adorned the stranger's ear.

_Those look like limiters. I can't sense much in the way of youki, and I'm no expert, so maybe they're just some fashion statement but if they're really what I think they are…I guess…maybe he also has a face he doesn't want the world to see._

He stepped back, fingering a lock of his own wine red hair, and laughing at his own thought processes.

_Nice I guess, if you can hide it. Some of us don't get that option. Though I don't really care whether you're a human or a youkai. Right now I picked you up, so I guess I'm gonna not let you die. It would be a pain if I wasted my money and you snuffed it, so you better be prepared to heal up. A month, the doctor said. Fine then. A month it is. Let's gamble on it, stranger. You live, I win. You die, you win. Those eyes sure looked like the eyes of a man who wanted to die, but I'm pretty good when it comes to gambling._

He sank down on the floor beneath the window, reaching for his cigarettes before remembering the doctor's warning, and he groaned, tossing them across the room and burying his head in his hands.

_Dammit, no smoking around the patient. Shit. I already almost forgot. Goddammit, this is my home. Why do I feel frigging guilty?_

He glared at the oblivious man, suddenly resentful of his presence.

"It's not like I asked you to come…although I guess I did, since I dragged you here," he amended his thoughts in mid-sentence, a rueful smile touching his features. "I guess I'm the idiot after all. Just don't you die on me. I'll be pissed at you if you do."

There was no response, but somehow Gojou was reassured by the gentle rise and fall of the other's chest beneath the thin blanket.

_Hell, maybe I was just looking for the company. _

He glanced at his hands, absently rubbing his fingers against his knuckles.

_Not that I miss Banri dragging me into shit…and having some other guy lurking around this place is gonna get in the way of my picking up girls…but…but…_

He glanced at the sleeping man again.

It was odd, he realised with some consternation, but it had been a while since he had cared so much about the welfare of another individual. Or…in fact…since he had cared much about anything. Life was there to be got through – gambled through and flirted over. It was easier that way, and getting involved with other people generally ended badly, so he rarely if ever initiated any contact beyond the women who sometimes warmed his bed on a cold night or the fools he took advantage of when gaming in order to scrape together enough coin to live. Money was precious, and he sure didn't share it, but despite that he had shelled out the doctor's demand without even thinking about it. It sat at odds with him, and no matter how he thought about it, he didn't understand. He didn't get involved with other people…not to the point he cared, not since Jien…

An image of a woman crying flickered into his mind, but before it could take hold, he cut off the recollection, pushing it back to the recesses of his mind before it could affect him. He was better off on his own, that was what life had taught him. Being on your own was less complicated in all regards.

_So why, then, did I bother spending two hours last evening cleaning up your wounds? Why the hell did I stop up all night to make sure you kept breathing? Why did I damn well spend half my day today hunting round the town for that cheapass quack doctor to come look you over, and spend the last of my coins on paying his fee? Why did I bring you here? If I'd left you, doubtless someone else would've picked you up…it's not like me to get involved, but…this time…_why did I_? _

A rueful smile crossed his scarred features.

_Well. Who knows, pretty boy. Maybe I fell for your looks. Heh. _

He glanced out of the window at the gleaming moon, then,

_If I can't smoke, and you're not about to shuffle on, I'm going to sleep. I'm tired as hell. But don't think I've any intention of losing the bet, whoever you are. You be alive when I wake up in the morning, else I'll be cross. Got it? This is my house. You're damn well not going to stiff out on me here!_


	2. Chapter 2

**That Night: Hakkai's Dream**

_So I wasn't going to add any to the oneshot, but I was thinking again about how the heck Hakkai got his limiters, and this happened. I'm not sure how I feel about it, overall, but I figured I'd share it, anyhow…  
The worst part of this for me was actually writing Gojou and Hakkai's lines in English, because while typing I can so hear Ishida Akira and Hirata Hiraoki voicing them in my head in Japanese...xD  
_

* * *

He had thought that silence was terrible but this, this was worse.

A shriek of anguish resonated in the stone-walled chamber, a roar that was not human, nor fully beast, and steeped in pain. It was the voice of the slain, crying out for vengeance,or the tears of a loved one lying bleeding on the floor, knife still clasped between her cooling fingers. It was the sound of Hell's minions coming to take away his soul.

It took a moment for him to realise that it was he who was screaming.

Everyone else was dead.

Before him, on the ground, lay the ripped apart corpse of his final victim. Unlike the others, who had been slashed with the blade of that same cursed knife, this one had truly been torn open, vital organs shredded and tossed onto the floor as though a wild animal had taken him for his prey.

Had _he_ done this?

He couldn't remember. Time and space seemed disjointed, seconds separated only by the rhythm of his racing heart.

Where was he? What was he doing here? Hadn't he come to rescue someone? All thoughts and feelings had been sucked away into the darkness, leaving only a hollow emptiness and the nagging sense that he had lost something, but could not work out what.

He had begun to scream again, without even realising it. Had he ever stopped? It was hard to be sure. The sound rattled raw through his vocal chords, jarring his chest and suddenly choking off in the middle by a coughing fit, as blood and bile surged up through his oesophagus and into his mouth. He retched and choked again, feeling as though for a moment he was drowning. The slick red liquid trickled down the corner of his mouth, as his air passages cleared, not fully, but just enough for him to resume a rasping, uneven inhale.

Had he been hurt then? Tentatively he moved his right hand towards his midriff, searching for damage. A demon's claw lunged suddenly towards his stomach, and he flinched back, the instincts of a wild animal to protect himself from attack kicking in before he realised that it was his own hand, not that of an attacker. His fingers seemed longer than he remembered, and as he touched them gingerly against his wound, the jagged edge of a long nail raked through the torn skin, causing him to yelp.

Yes, there was blood. He drew his hand away, staring at it in detached consternation. The blood did not repulse him, rather he felt compelled to put the talons to his lips, tasting the salt against his tongue. The sickly sweet scent so close to his nostrils caused his pulse to skip in sudden excitement. He took a sharp intake of breath, pain for the first time beginning to register as bit by bit his senses returned.

His _senses_? Was that what they were?

He drew back the hand, noticing for the first time a winding leaf pattern that twisted itself like prison chains against his pale skin. Brushing the talons of the other hand against it, he saw that it too was similarly branded and, as he touched the edges of the leaves, they moved slightly, as though they were not simply a tattoo, but a living organism, feeding off his aura and evolving across his body in search of more prey. A tendril of the vine began to snake speculatively up his index finger, and he drew the hands apart hurriedly, feeling the tug as the dissatisfied entity bored its way back in between the wafer thin layers of his skin. He rubbed at it frantically, but it did not fade or even wither. It had become a part of him, and more, he could feel its malevolent energy beneath his touch.

He shifted his gaze away, no longer wanting to contemplate what had taken root within his body, and as he did so, he registered with graphic clarity the scene of death and devastation that surrounded him. Slowly it began to dawn on him that this had been his work, and every single life he had snuffed out. His hands were shaking now, his fingers twitching with anger and with fear. His whole body was rippling and trembling with energy and hatred unlike that he had ever known before, a curdling bloodlust that demanded vengeance, but there was nobody left here on whom to sate it, and little by little, his sanity had begun to return.  
_  
San...ity?_

No. It was not sanity. A man who had killed so many people did not possess such a thing. A man who was no longer a man, in fact, but a monster - a monster, soaked in the blood of his victims.

The vine that had patterned his wrists was spreading, now. He could feel it, moving up his arms and across his torso, down towards his wounded stomach and below, to his legs and feet. It was feeding from him, he realised dully, nourished by the blood of the thousand demons he had slain and brought fully to life by that of the last, a demon whose name he didn't know, but whose soul's presence he could still feel burning a curse against his skin. Was that the root of the vine, then? Was the encroaching weed that, bit by bit was imprisoning him from head to toe the last sadistic legacy of that sneering individual, whose drops of blood had sizzled like poison against his wounds, dulling pain and heightening everything else in an explosion of killing lust.

Yes, he knew now, what he was.

He was an abomination, mutated by his own guilt and rage, whose body had twisted into this grotesque form as punishment for his deeds. The thousand demon souls screeched out for vengeance and blood within him, knotted together by that of the last, the only one who had given his blood willingly, that mocking, icy smirk on his sallow face. Even as a corpse, that expression had not gone. He could not look at it. He did not want to remember what a thousand dead demon souls could do to a human body and mind.

Slowly and unsteadily he dragged himself to his feet, staggering a few steps towards the cage bars where Kan'an's cooling body lay. For a moment he stared at her, but, although he knew that as he was now he could break through into her prison and take her in his arms, he could not bear to sully her body with his touch. He could not see that rampant vine wind itself across her delicate skin, spreading across and scarring the beautiful face that had always given him so much hope and joy. No human could commit the sins he had committed to come here, and he was human no more. He was not like her, now. He was like them...the ones who had taken her, hurt her, raped her and forced her into such despair that she had taken her own life. How could he touch her? How could he even go near her, in such a state as he was now? He had not protected her from them, but at least, he would protect her from him.

Without realising it, he had begun to back away, the loss of blood making him light-headed as he stumbled towards the door. There was silence, now, instead of the screams, punctuated only by the gasps of his breathing as the pain in his stomach became more and more intense.

His body felt unnatural and heavy, difficult to move and assaulted with wave upon wave of rage and guilt. The fiery red mist that had descended upon him on hearing of Kan'an's abduction had been replaced by the murky darkness of self-destructive despair that still threatened to swallow him up whole.

It was raining outside, the slick droplets washing some of the blood from his damaged body. The ice coolness only made the pain worse, but he forced himself on, step after step, until he could walk no more.

He sank to the ground, talons digging deep into the earth. Tendrils of hungry vine seeped out from his body into the ground, preventing him from getting up again, but he didn't care. He had become a monster. As a monster, he should die. Like the monsters he had slain, one after another, without a second thought. He was not worthy of anything, not now. He had not saved Kan'an and he had become one of them, and like them, he would die.

His gaze caught sight of his reflection in a nearby puddle, and despite how weak he felt, he flinched back at what he saw. Long, pointed ears jutted out from either side of his head. His hair was a messy tangle across his brow, whilst the vine had spread even this far, covering his nose and cheeks like a cruel scar.

As he met his gaze in the water, he saw reptilian gold eyes staring back at him, making his face even more like a stranger's. His heart ached as he remembered how Kan'an had loved his green eyes. Maybe that was why they too had been taken from him, he reflected bitterly, turning his head away.  
_  
I do not want to die like this._

Little by little, the thought began to stir in the depths of his mind. At first it was barely more than a whisper, but as it gathered pace, it echoed into the empty forest around him, until he realised that he had spoken them out loud. He repeated them, once, then again, and again and again until they became a feverish mantra, over and over as though somehow, by pure will alone, he could turn back time. He was still bleeding, the blood from his injuries seeping into the puddles and staining the ground around him a deep crimson. His consciousness was starting to blur at the edges, but he did not relent, the words coming from his lips louder and louder as his grief surged inside of him.

Something split the sky above his head, a crash and burst of light so bright that he felt certain that, in the heavens, a storm had come to join the rain. The light had blinded him, making the whole forest nothing but a cloud of lights before his eyes, and then, as it began to fade, his body fell slack against the ground, his arms longer having the strength to hold him up.

The forest was silent now. His lips moved slightly, but he could not make the words any more. In that moment of light, the last of his energy had failed him. Death and darkness awaited him, but he was, somehow, at peace. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the edge of his hand, bloodstained and muddy but no longer wrapped in the tendril of the vine. The claws that had dug deep into the earth were gone, as though they had been no more than a hallucination or a bad dream.

He had killed people, many people, and he would die here. But he was not a monster after all. He was a man...a man called Cho Gonou, and he was ready to go.

Hell's messengers always knew how to find sinners. He would wait for them here, till the dark and cold no longer bothered him, and he could no longer feel the pain in his gut.

As he shifted his head slightly against the ground, he felt something cold and hard pressing against his ear. As he pondered what the strange sensation might be, he felt the last of his consciousness seep out of him, and he slumped forward into the black.

"Hey, you dead?"

The voice pierced through the gloom, the faintest glimmer of light breaking up the shadow. Something hard nudged against his damaged stomach, sending dulled signals of pain through his abused body, and he groaned, twitching slightly as though trying to escape from the discomfort that was bringing him back towards the surface.

"Huh? Guess you're alive..."

The voice sounded surprised, and there was a soft rustle, as though someone was bending over him.

Gonou's eyes opened very slightly, but it was not possible for him to make out clearly who or what was speaking to him. A demon? A human? Friend? Foe?

Whatever it was, it was cloaked in crimson.

_Hell's...messenger?_

A faint smile twitched at his lips, resignation and satisfaction glittering in his green eyes. He could not make out the gaze of the other so close to him, but the red comforted him.

Something else in this world was as stained with blood as he was. It was right this way.

It was time to go.

_Goodbye, Kan'an._

Gonou closed his eyes, his limp body falling forward once more into the mud.

* * *

Gonou opened his eyes. The room was small and square, littered with empty beer cans, fast food boxes and cigarette butts, some of which had clearly been tossed into ashtrays from a considerable distance. The light was electric, but the bulb was cheap and it flickered at odd intervals, a fly buzzing drunkenly around the unstable glow. The air smelt slightly of stale smoke, coupled with something that reminded Gonou of the pollution of the city streets, and a thin, rough blanket was pulled up over his body, its surface coarse against his skin.

_Hell..?_

He blinked, struggling to absorb the surreal normality of his surroundings.

"Hell...really is a plain kind of place,"

The words slipped from his lips, and at their sound, he heard the squeak of a chair leg against a bare wood floor.

The next minute, a face was pushed into his, the long crimson tail of hair that fell down over the stranger's shoulder matched in blood hue only by the irritated shade of the other man's eyes.

"Sorry, I'm sure, for being plain."

The voice was blunt, the syllables lazy and ill-formed, and Gonou felt a sense of uncertainty creep over him.

That red...

_Kan'an._

He closed his eyes briefly, remembering the splash of blood as his partner had taken her own life.

_Well, I guess I'm still here. I guess I won't go without seeing you off properly, Kan'an. Wait for me. I'll come back for you._

_And then, when it's done...maybe I'll see you on the other side._


End file.
